Braves say false alarm caused by equipment malfunction

ATLANTA (AP) An alarm and an emergency evacuation message on a sign board during the Atlanta Braves' game late Tuesday night turned out to be a false alarm.

The Braves issued a statement on Wednesday which explained that a small grease fire on a grill at the ''Chop House'' restaurant in right field unnecessarily triggered the high alert.

The team said the fire was quickly extinguished but smoke detectors triggered an alarm which lasted about 5 seconds. Also, a message flashed on sign boards stating an emergency had been reported in the building and an evacuation was taking place.

''The smoke set off the detector which triggered the alarm system at its highest level,'' the statement said. ''The incident was not caused by any altercation and the malfunction in the alarm system has been corrected.''

The Braves beat the Pirates 6-5 in a game delayed three hours by rain. The game ended early Wednesday morning.

When the alarm sounded, Atlanta pitcher R.A. Dickey paused for a couple of seconds before his next toss to Pittsburgh's Andrew McCutchen. The umpires didn't stop play and the game continued without interruption.

The Braves tweeted in the fourth inning that ''everything is operating normally'' and ''we apologize for the inconvenience.''

A statement from the Cobb County Police Department said ''there never was a security issue or an evacuation of the park. There was a situation in the Chop House, but it was quickly handled. Again, there is no public safety threat at this time.''

This is the Braves' first season at SunTrust Park.

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More AP baseball: https://apnews.com/tag/MLBbaseball

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